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II. DESCRIPTION FOR VIVIDNESS
25. Aim.—In taking up what may be termed Description for Vividness, we pass from the field of plain composition to the field of literary art. The aim in this case is to make an impression by skilful suggestion, to evoke mental images swiftly and sharply rather than to construct them mechanically piece by piece. Clearness is not so much sought as force: the appeal is from the senses to the senses, and it is made not so much through the understanding as through the imagination. The personality of the writer is given free play. Indeed, the whole subject admits a larger license than does accurate description, and therefore may not be so closely hedged about by rules. 26. Subject and Point of View.—Manifestly, where clearness is not the describer's object, the rule re¬quiring a circumscribed field and a carefully defined point of view will not rigidly hold. The subject may be indefinite, quite impossible to describe with scien¬tific accuracy. If, for example, we were writing of a New England boy who had recently moved to the West, we might wish to describe the scenes with which he was formerly familiar. His mind would go back, perhaps, to "the white gabled home, set back in the quiet, elm-shaded street; the apple-orchard on the rocky hillside; the shabby little schoolhouse, set over against the church, with its tall white spire and rigid weathercock; the high flagpole and the old cannon on the village green, where the Fourth-of-July speeches were made; the store, with dilapidated bowling-alley behind; the swimming-hole under the willows; the long coasting-hill back of the black¬smith's." No camera could take in all this; were we to try to fit a title to it, we could find no more definite one than "A New England Village." Yet the subject has unity, in a sense, for the mind accepts the details as parts of a single general impression. But the subject need not be indefinite: it may be as restricted as a subject for accurate description. There must, however, be a single mood in which it is viewed. The same house, which may be described accurately and unemotionally so that a stranger might recognize it, might appear restful and homelike to the mother who had lived long in it, shabby and mean to the son who had tired of it, romantic to the cousins who came to visit in it, old and worthless to the real-estate agent who came to appraise it. Each might describe it, yet the accounts would differ widely; first, because each would choose the details which would seem to him most significant, and secondly, because the words that each would use would get their color from his personal feeling. Moreover, if the moods of the description are mixed, the reader will feel it at once. The unity of which we are now speaking consists not in the proximity of material details, but in harmony of general effect. 27. Arrangement and Proportion.-1 Beginning.— When the description is colored by some special feeling of the observer, the reader ought to be aware, at the beginning, of the mood in which the description is to be carried on. This need not be done formally and obviously. Indeed if the descriptive passage occurs in the midst of a story, no explanation need be given at all. But sometimes certain facts must be shown, however unobtrusively. Billy marched stoutly on, whistling hard to keep up his courage, for an errand through the woods in the growing darkness is a very different thing from one in daylight. The trees looked black and unfamiliar, and never before had he noticed the loudness of his own footsteps. The description may go on from there unhampered by any concern but vividness: the reader knows everything now that he need, to understand the mood of the passage. 2. Order of Details.—We can follow no set rules as to the order in which details should be introduced. But common sense will furnish a suggestion or two. It is advisable to make the beginning significant of what is to follow, never to let the first impression be colorless or misleading. In describing a regiment setting out to war we would not begin by saying that the men marched twelve abreast; that was unimpor¬tant, if not purely accidental. But the crowds, the cheering, the bearing of the soldiers, the music— whatever distinguished the scene from a Memorial Day parade, say, is what would furnish us with the details worthy of the important place at the beginning of the description. In the body of the description a natural method is to g:ve the details in the order of prominence. A city sport, for example, would be easily recognized by his clothing, face, and manner, and these things would probably be observed and recorded in the order just given. Sometimes an appearance of dis¬order may even be helpful, as, for example, in the following: As I turned the corner my ears were assailed with a confused shouting, mingled with the barking of dogs and the distressed neighing of a horse. A group of men in various kinds of clothing occupied the middle of the street, towards which other men and boys of every age were excitedly running. Women, with hands clutching vaguely at loosely flowing wrappers, stood tiptoe on doorsteps. Shutters were thrown open with a bang, and heads pro¬truded from upper windows. 3. Ending.—As in the matter of the selection and order of details, so also in the matter of the conclusion, much depends on the personality of the observer and the purpose of the description. Somehow, the reader should be made to feel that the descript:on has come to a close. Some particularly significant detail will accomplish this, or some general statement as to the impression of the subject as a whole, perhaps a glance at aspects of the subject confessedly left untouched. Obviously enough, however, this ought not to be done obtrusively. Better a feeling of abruptness than an unnaturally formal, labored conclusion. 28. Expression.—The one quality that a descrip tion must have if it is to make the direct appeal we wish it to make is sincerity—sincerity in the feeling we try to convey, and sincerity in the words we select to express it. Sincerity will save us, for one thing, from pretending to a maturity of experience and emotion that is not properly our own, the expression of which can result only in strained artificiality. The boy did not understand this who took to moralizing about the moon as follows: We look below, all around us, sorrow is there. But look away from the earth and man! See the silent moon! Silent, yet how it speaks to the heart, how it soothes the troubled mind! Sincerity will save us, too, from selecting the out¬worn expressions of hack writers that bring with them, though half unconsciously to ourselves, the flavor of the cheap literature in which they are found. Again, it will save us from extravagance of phrase and reck¬lessness of figure. This phase of the subject is more particularly treated in the chapter on words. But no list of examples can be complete; only by correct¬ing the attitude of mind can the fault, when it arises, be overcome. If we write as we see and feel, we need never be afraid that the results will be dull and unin¬teresting. One thing more. We must not forget that we can describe as well by narration as by stopping deliber¬ately to note facts and characteristics. "The land¬lord waddled out and bowed profoundly, shifting his tobacco from one fat cheek to the other." Already we have a picture of him, and, more than that, some idea of his essential character and habits. There is no need to explain elaborately that a man has a dis¬agreeable look in his eye, and gives one a feeling of distrust and aversion, if we say simply that he." stood leering" at the passers-by. And if a man "slinks" out of a doorway, we do not need an accumulation of adjectives to show what manner of man he is. Many are the resources for striking, realistic description, but few are more useful, either for giving the initial impression or for keeping it vividly in the reader's mind, than a sympathetic, judicious use of suggestive verbs throughout our writing.